The Storytellers have been eagerly waiting for our duck eggs to hatch, but as they are now overdue, we are still keeping our fingers crossed that our little ducklings will arrive soon!

 In the meantime, we were very lucky to have a fabulous parent bring in some newly hatched chicks for the children to see and gently handle. This was such a wonderful experience for the children, giving them the opportunity to observe the tiny chicks up close, talk about how to care for animals, and learn about the life cycle of birds.

The children were incredibly calm, gentle, and caring whilst holding the chicks, and they thoroughly enjoyed watching them cheep, move around, and snuggle together. It was a lovely hands-on learning experience that created lots of excitement, curiosity, and conversation throughout the day.

It has been an incredibly busy week this week: This newsletter will give just a snapshot of what we have been up to! Year 6 have all done their KS2 SATs tests. There were some tricky questions but each and every one of them tried their hardest and I am so proud of all of them. It is never an easy week, but they all need to remember that whatever their results, SATs will only show what they are like in that test and not what they are like as people, their passions, ambition and what they all succeed in each day. Well done Year 6! Class 1 had a great trip to St Jospeh's in Launceston this Tuesday. The children got involved in a lot of different sports and games. Who knew they would be so good at cricket! Thank-you to St Joseph's for hosting the day. Next week is the final week of this half term - I know, it seems to have flown by! Friday is an INSET day, and school is closed to pupils but before then, Class 2 are joining with 4 other schools to perform in the "Festival of Belonging". They have been working really hard on their performance, and we are all looking forward to the show. Please see the posters and flyers that have gone home for more details. All are welcome! Thank-you to you all for keeping the zig-zag lines at the front of school free at drop-off and pickup time. This has really helped the safety of the pupils. Can I also ask again that children are not permitted to play on the trim trail on the playground at the start and end of the day. These are unsupervised times and we want to make sure that the children are safe. Finally, we have noticed an increase in small toys being brought in from home. We understand that some children need items to fidget with in class to maintain concentration and these children have had conversations with staff and the school are able to provide fidgets for these children as we have a supply in school. If you feel your child would benefit from this, please talk to staff. We are not responsible for anything brought from home without prior consent and items seen will be removed in class and returned home.

Storytellers set off on a big bug hunt through our beautiful forest and hedgerow habitat, but before we began exploring, we talked about where insects and bugs might like to live and what they might need in their homes, such as leaves, logs, damp soil and long grass. 

The children each took a little toy bug with them and carefully searched for the perfect place where they thought their bug would like to live. Some chose cosy spots under leaves, while others found fallen logs, mossy areas and tiny hiding places amongst the hedgerows.

 The children thoroughly enjoyed exploring the woods, climbing, searching and discovering the natural world around them. Activities like this help children build confidence, curiosity and an understanding of nature, while developing their communication, teamwork and problem-solving skills through play and exploration

We have had a super busy week at Brunel and couldn't be prouder of our Year 6 children who have been so determined and focussed during their End of KS2 SATS. It has also been a busy week with visitors, trips and super learning experiences for our children. We hope that you all have a wonderful weekend and we look forward to seeing you all on Monday. In the meantime, please enjoy browsing through this week's edition of The Brunel Bulletin. 

Friday 15th May

Some of this weeks learning

In English this week the children have been drawing pictures from our story and then writing small captions underneath to match their picture. Then the children have been writing lists of their favourite fruits ready to finish our unit of work next week by making Hungry Caterpillar fruit kebabs. The adults were so impressed with the children's phoneme to grapheme correspondence, and we have had some amazing writing.  

In maths this week we have concentrated on adding more. We have done this in many ways using lots of different resources. The children have worked hard at using full mathematical sentences when answering questions and using mats I the provision.  

The children have continued to embrace the minibeast life and have been real scientists looking at and exploring, classifying and describing. They have also made painted butterflies and have drawn bees and bee hives after our special community visitor Liam came to show us his bee keeping equipment and tell us all about bees and how honey is made. We even got the chance to taste honey and try on a bee keeping suit!

We continue to be amazed with how well the children are progressing

We wish you  a wonderful weekend

The Foundation Team 

I am so incredibly proud of year 6 this week! They have approached SATs with maturity, determination and resilience. 

They have taken all the tests in their stride and gave them all their full effort. I hope they have a much deserved relaxing weekend!

Miss Burton

This week, the class have been busy exploring our science topic on habitats through an exciting practical activity, grafting willow. Although our attempts did not work out quite as we had hoped, it provided a valuable learning opportunity and sparked lots of thoughtful discussion about what plants need to survive and grow. During our time outdoors, we also made a lovely discovery of a stray caterpillar, which quickly became a focus of interest. Josh, in particular, has been making some fantastic observations about the caterpillar and has linked his ideas brilliantly to our learning about the life cycles of mammals, well done Josh! Year 6 have also shown incredible perseverance this week as they tackled their SATs with determination and maturity, and they should feel extremely proud of all their hard work. To celebrate the end of a busy week, we enjoyed a well-deserved class picnic together. We would also like to invite parents to come into the classroom tomorrow from 8:40am to take a look at the wonderful writing the children have been producing, we look forward to sharing it with you!

Tregantle Class Visit Saltash Fire Station

This week, Tregantle Class enjoyed an exciting visit to Saltash Fire Station.

The children walked to the station and spent the afternoon learning all about fire safety and fire prevention. The firefighters showed the children around the fire station and explained how they help keep the community safe.

Everyone loved exploring the fire engine and discovering all of the different equipment carried onboard. One of the highlights of the visit was having the chance to use the water hose and aim at a target - the children had so much fun taking turns and showing off their aiming skills!

The children also enjoyed trying on the firefighters' protective kit and pretending to be firefighters themselves. It was wonderful to see their enthusiasm and curiosity throughout the visit.

A huge thank you to everyone at Saltash Fire Station for welcoming us and inspiring the next generation of firefighters!

Our focus story is We're going on a picnic' and we designed our own picnic blankets today at St Anne's.

We had a wonderful afternoon with the residents and staff at St Anne's this week - who really enjoyed listening to our poetry readings - these were the incredible poems we wrote for the Fowey Festival Competition about animals that come out 'After Dark'. 
We also enjoyed listening to the memories and stories the residents shared with us about their own pets and favourite animals. Thank you to St Anne's for hosting us and we look forward to seeing you all again soon! 

Well done to Team Brunel who had several prize winners and several runners-up and highly commended in the competition. Two prize winners were invited to Fowey Harbour Hotel for a special presentation with their families and won Waterstones vouchers. What a creative group of young people we have at Brunel!

We have continued with exploring planting and growing this week at nursery.
The children have planted sunflower seeds and are very excited that their flower and broad bean seeds from last week are starting to grow!
They have enjoyed some still life painting of fruit this week. The children have identified different fruits in the bowl, naming them and discussing differences before having a go at painting them with some great results.

At story time this week we have read the book "Supertato" and "Tilly Plants a Tree". The children have been encouraged to identify different parts of plants from the book such as petal, stem and leaves.

In phonics this week we have been channeling our inner superhero's and have been making speech sounds to different superhero moves. The children used instruments to play along to the song "Superhero's in the sky" and have been matching initial sounds to the correct superhero.

In maths we have continued to create our own patterns and recognition of different numbers.

We have four more days until the half term now and just a little reminder that next Friday is an INSET day so we will be closed.

Have a good weekend

Julie and Sarah

Playtimes are always enhanced when we have access to the field and this year we have introduced additional equipment to make the playtime experience even more positive. Here are a few photos of the children enjoying the opportunities they have for socialising and positive play.


Well done to our Year 6 pupils who completed their SATs this week. However we try to reduce the pressure, inevitably, some children will always feel anxious about doing these tests. They all did incredibly well and can look forward to finishing the term without the shadow of SATs hanging over them. Next half term, the Year 6 pupils will have the opportunity to attend transition sessions in preparation for secondary school. Parents and carers can access guidance on how to support their children with transition to secondary school by accessing this workshop:



Congratulations to Lesley Connell who got married at the weekend. Lesley will now be known as Mrs Sammels, but is very understanding of anyone who forgets and calls her Mrs Connell - she still forgets herself!

A free half term opportunity for children:

These sessions are open to children aged 5-12, each session will be approximately 2 hours long. 

Sign up will close one week before the session date, or when the session reaches capacity, whichever comes first.

If your child is into drama, why not sign up to this free opportunity at an amazing setting. It is a long way to travel but well worth it and it could be combined with a family day out in the beautiful west of our county:

This week the children have all enjoyed planting some sunflower seeds, in the hope that little shoots will start to show in the next week or so.

All the children thoroughly enjoyed learning about the key features of the life cycle of a plant and showed their understanding with a sequence sticking activity, showing what happens when we plant a seed.

We are expanding this learning over the next couple of weeks as we begin to look at the many wonderful minibeasts that we may find in the garden and look at some of the life cycles of these too!

This topic is always good for group discussions on the importance of respecting and caring for living things and our natural environments.  The children have all shared their own experiences and understanding through our grand conversations at carpet time.

The children this half term have had lots of number challenges given to them, to really build up their confidence in number recognition.  We encourage counting in all areas of play, even when reading a story, and its good practice even at home to count small groups of objects and then to know the last number reached. We have also been practicing showing our 'finger numbers' to numbers 1-10 alongside this.

With this being a very short term before we begin our final term before summer break, I want to reassure parents of those children that will be starting Reception in September that all information will come out to you in plenty of time.  There will also be an opportunity to book a parent consultation with a member of the team during Summer Term 2.  We will let you know available dates after half term.

The Pre-School Team.